At this point in time, I am writing to reflect on the past year. I cannot believe that Eddie and I have completed our pilgrimage. I can remember that at this time last year I was planning and checking out airfares, watching the exchange rates, planning the details where we would stay, what we would pack... I was planning excitedly, enjoying every moment of anticipation.
I sit here now feeling so grateful that I achieved this goal of mine. Oddly enough, I want to go back and do it again...perhaps do the full Camino from St. Jean Pied de Port, perhaps the Camino Ingles... I now KNOW that all I have to do is commit in word and intent and I can make it happen.
Two and a half months after returning from our trip, our lives were rocked. Our son (my stepson) had been undergoing treatment for leukemia--having been diagnosed in Oct. of 2012. At the time of diagnosis, the shock of CANCER in someone who was just 30 years old was devastating. But faith and hope buoyed us up and, in some sense, perhaps going to Fatima to pray and to dedicate such intense prayer as during the walk on the Camino, maybe I was hoping for extra favor... to be spared the experience of watching my husband lose his second youngest son. To be spared watching my own son grieve the loss of his brother. To spare me having to be the strong one for them when I just wanted to be a basket case.
But God had other plans. Leukemia sucks. Cancer sucks. Death , I truly believe, is a release to a place that is better. A place where there is no pain and there is no suffering. I believe there is just love, all enveloping, comforting, peace giving LOVE. And we who are left behind suffer and feel incredible pain and emptiness. But when we remember LOVE we can heal. Somewhat...
I sit here now feeling so grateful that I achieved this goal of mine. Oddly enough, I want to go back and do it again...perhaps do the full Camino from St. Jean Pied de Port, perhaps the Camino Ingles... I now KNOW that all I have to do is commit in word and intent and I can make it happen.
Two and a half months after returning from our trip, our lives were rocked. Our son (my stepson) had been undergoing treatment for leukemia--having been diagnosed in Oct. of 2012. At the time of diagnosis, the shock of CANCER in someone who was just 30 years old was devastating. But faith and hope buoyed us up and, in some sense, perhaps going to Fatima to pray and to dedicate such intense prayer as during the walk on the Camino, maybe I was hoping for extra favor... to be spared the experience of watching my husband lose his second youngest son. To be spared watching my own son grieve the loss of his brother. To spare me having to be the strong one for them when I just wanted to be a basket case.
But God had other plans. Leukemia sucks. Cancer sucks. Death , I truly believe, is a release to a place that is better. A place where there is no pain and there is no suffering. I believe there is just love, all enveloping, comforting, peace giving LOVE. And we who are left behind suffer and feel incredible pain and emptiness. But when we remember LOVE we can heal. Somewhat...